California Supreme Court Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar, seen in January, wrote the 4-3 ruling that said a government agency’s legal bills are generally public record in cases that have been resolved. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Maura Dolan December 30, 2016

A government agency’s legal bills for a case that has been resolved are generally public record, a divided California Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

So far, none of California’s 55 senators and representatives have announced plans to retire ahead of the 2018 election. But after weeks at home with family during the holidays to talk about the future, such declarations could come soon.

For nearly five years, the Public Corruption and Civil Rights section of the U.S. attorney’s office had been building and winning cases against a group from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department accused of carrying out a plan to obstruct a federal investigation into allegations of inmate abuse at the county jails.

On Jan. 20, Donald Trump will take the oath of office having never released his tax returns, the first incoming president not to do so in four decades. | Photographer: John Taggart/Bloomberg via Getty Images

By Annie Karni 12/23/16 – 05:58 AM EST

He is shining a light on how much of the American political system is encoded in custom and how little is based in the law.

President-elect Donald Trump has said he might do away with regular press briefings and daily intelligence reports. He wants to retain private security while receiving secret service protection, even after the inauguration. He is encouraging members of his family to take on formal roles in his administration, testing the limits of anti-nepotism statutes. And he is pushing the limits of ethics laws in trying to keep a stake in his business.

Former Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca walked out of federal court Thursday almost a free man after jurors said they were hopelessly deadlocked and a judge declared a mistrial in his jail corruption trial.

Jim Brulte

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By Carla Marinucci 12/22/16 – 06:00 AM EST

SAN FRANCISCO — Jim Brulte, the current chair of the California Republican Party, once served as a high-profile backer of National Popular Vote, a movement that supports the elimination of the Electoral College.

Pension costs for state and local government will begin to rise in 2017 after CalPERS officials voted to throttle back the expectations on profits earned from its $299 billion portfolio.

By John Myers Dec. 21, 2016

In the four years since California’s largest pension fund recalibrated its investment projections, the annual contribution from state and local governments — in effect, the money paid by taxpayers — has slowly been on the rise.

Voters passed Proposition 66, a ballot measure that aims to speed up the death penalty. No one has been executed in California since 2006 because of legal challenges to the lethal injection protocol. (Manny Crisostomo/Sacramento Bee file)

Los Angeles County had more cases of politicians and others successfully prosecuted for violating campaign finance and ethics rules than any other county in California this year, the state Fair Political Practices Commission reported Tuesday.

A judge said Friday that he might find Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens in contempt of court because of her department’s reaction to an order to produce documents in the trial of admitted killer Scott Dekraai.

The Democratic Party has latched onto reports citing anonymous CIA sources who allege the Russians tried to sway the 2016 presidential election. After blaming Fake News, the FBI, racism, sexism and the Electoral College, it appears the newest scapegoat for Hillary Clinton’s and the party’s crushing defeat is Russia.

Former Los Angeles County Sheriff, Lee Baca, and his wife, Carol Chiang, leave the United States Court after his arraignment on Friday, August 12, 2016. File photo. (Photo by Dean Musgrove/Los Angeles Daily News)

Former Sheriff Lee Baca, who led the largest law enforcement department of its kind in the nation, may take the witness stand in his own defense in an ongoing federal jail corruption trial, his attorney announced Thursday.

The U.S. Department of Justice is launching a civil rights investigation into the Orange County District Attorney’s Office and the Sheriff’s Department over allegations that prosecutors and police routinely withhold evidence and use jailhouse informants to illegally obtain confessions. From left, District Attorney Tony Rackauckas and Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens. (Photos by Orange County Register/SCNG)

The U.S. Department of Justice launched a civil rights investigation of the Orange County District Attorney’s Office and the Sheriff’s Department on Thursday over allegations that prosecutors and deputies withhold evidence and use jailhouse informants to illegally obtain confessions.

One way to look at the election of Donald Trump is that it is a repudiation of the cult of political correctness that thrives — metastasizes might be a better word — on college and university campuses. One particularly egregious example, the bogus prosecution of Duke University lacrosse players in 2006 and 2007, seems to have had particular reverberations in producing election results this year, a decade later. For a definitive account of the disgraceful behavior of Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong, Duke President Richard Brodhead and dozens of members of the Duke faculty, see KC Johnson and Stuart Taylor’s book Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case.

In a ruling made just before the close of business hours Tuesday, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) directed Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric to meet with groups critical of a 2014 agreement that calls on utility ratepayers to shoulder about 70 percent of the costs from shutting down the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.

Steve Schmidt, the Republican strategist who advised John McCain’s presidential bid and helped elect Arnold Schwarzenegger governor of California, imagines a not-too-distant future where the GOP here ceases to wield the influence of a major party and instead becomes the state’s largest interest group.

Democrats are growing uneasy with the number of generals President-elect Donald Trump has tapped for his administration, citing concerns about the amount of sway the military will have in the government.

Supervisor Marion Ashley suggests that his peers defer pay increases since unions are being asked to hold the line on raises.

Riverside County Supervisor Marion Ashley wants his peers to defer the automatic pay raises they received over the summer to show empathy with union employees, who also are being asked to forgo raises.

Over Sen. Barbara Boxer’s objections, the Senate voted 78 to 21 Friday evening to pass sweeping water infrastructure legislation that changes how much water is pumped from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to San Joaquin Valley farmers and Southern California.

Two ex-Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies who have been convicted of obstructing an FBI civil rights investigation into the county jails told a federal jury on Friday that they believed they were following orders from former Sheriff Lee Baca.

The Field Poll, which for more than a half-century has been the gold standard for public opinion research, is ceasing operations Friday, leaving behind a fabled track record of accurately reflecting the highs and lows of California’s biggest players and issues.

SAN BERNARDINO >> A day after the city emerged from its 53-month bankruptcy, city officials marked the “watershed moment” with a detailed statement on what they’ve done since filing for bankruptcy and their plans for the future.

With tuition hikes being discussed for California’s public universities, a new poll shows a strong majority of residents identifying college affordability as a big problem, including at least half of adults across wide partisan, income, and age groups.

California National Guardsmen line up at Fort Irwin in San Bernardino County. (Los Angeles Times)

David S. Cloud December 9, 2016

The Senate overwhelmingly approved a $619-billion defense authorization bill Thursday that includes direct help for thousands of California National Guard soldiers and veterans facing repayment demands for long-ago enlistment bonuses.

Former Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, and his wife Carol Chiang, arrive on Friday, Aug. 12, 2016, for his arraignment at the federal courthouse in Los Angeles. Baca’s trial began Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2016. (File photo by John McCoy/Los Angeles Daily News)

Former L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca was “the heartbeat of conspiracy” when it came to hiding abuses within Men’s Central Jail, and he did nothing to hold deputies who beat inmates accountable, prosecutors said in federal court Wednesday.

A federal judge said Tuesday that she would approve San Bernardino’s bankruptcy plan, meaning that the city can begin the process of emerging from four years of bankruptcy. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

Paloma Esquivel December 6, 2016

After four long, painful years, San Bernardino will soon emerge from bankruptcy.

Two newly elected Los Angeles County supervisors brought historic changes to local politics Monday when they became part of a supermajority of women to serve on the largest local governmental body in the nation.

Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals, shown in October, is hearing the challenge in the Cole Wilkins case. Goethals is also the judge in the Scott Dekraai mass murder case. (Ken Steinhardt/File Photo)

The Orange County District Attorney’s Office, harshly criticized in a recent appellate court ruling for a systemic failure to protect defendants’ rights and under investigation by the state attorney general and the county grand jury, is facing a new legal challenge that could remove it from a second high-profile murder case in less than two years.

The judge who until a few weeks ago was in charge of the long-running San Onofre case before the California Public Utilities Commission has taken a job with a contractor to plant owner Southern California Edison.

Rep. Xavier Becerra. | AP Photo/Andrew Harnik

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By Carla Marinucci 12/01/16 – 05:17 PM EST

SAN FRANCISCO — With his nomination to become California’s first Latino attorney general, Rep. Xavier Becerra is now primed to be the public face of the Democratic resistance to Donald Trump on issues like climate change, health care and, most visibly, immigration.

Rep. Xavier Becerra, D-Los Angeles, grew up in Sacramento, the son of Mexican immigrants.

Gov. Jerry Brown has tabbed Rep. Xavier Becerra to serve as California’s interim attorney general, selecting the Los Angeles Democrat to fill a vacancy opened by the imminent departure of outgoing Attorney General Kamala Harris to the U.S. Senate.

San Bernardino County Supervisor Curt Hagman has fired his chief of staff, Mike Spence, after Spence was charged with driving under the influence of drugs and admitted to battling drug and alcohol addictions for more than 20 years.